After 6 months, ABC's Gibson is settling in

Published 6:30 am, Wednesday, November 15, 2006

ABC News anchor Charles Gibson has been on the new job six months, and he's getting the feel for it.

ABC News anchor Charles Gibson has been on the new job six months, and he's getting the feel for it.

Photo: James Nielsen, Houston Chronicle

After 6 months, ABC's Gibson settling in to World News

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When he accepted the job as anchor of ABC News, Charles Gibson only had an inkling of how his life might change and how important his role would be.

Six months since becoming the front man for World News, he has emerged as a calm and effective leader of a news division deeply rattled by the death of its champion, Peter Jennings, and subsequent events involving Jennings' successors, Bob Woodruff, who was injured in Iraq, and Elizabeth Vargas, who left after announcing her pregnancy.

He effectively anchored World News through election night, including an extra 30 minutes of airtime when ABC decided to start its coverage early. It paid off; ABC's broadcast was the most-watched.

Gibson, in town Tuesday to anchor World News and visit with Channel 13 staff, revisited that challenging period.

A: Yeah, it was good. Not having done it before, I was very anxious about it.

Q:The extra half-hour helped.

A: It did. Somebody wrote that we withheld (the time change) from the news so no one could match us. What happened was, we asked the West Coast for the time and after some back-and-forth, we worked it out.

Q:Surely you weren't upset about it.

A: No, I wanted it. I was not unaware of the fact that Dancing (With the Stars) would give us a good lead-in.

Q: How does coming to Houston throw you off your routine?

A: It doesn't really; you feel a little bit out of touch. We're here not just because we're doing a story (about how Houston is dealing with immigrants) but simply because this (KTRK) is a great station and a lot of people in the country still don't know that I've changed jobs. I told the story last night at a reception in Dallas, that one of the guys flying the plane came back and said, 'Mr. Gibson, I watch you every morning.' And I didn't want to say him, it's been six months.

Q:Do you missGood Morning Americasometimes?

A: Oh sure. There's something about those hours that create a bond among people who work on the broadcast. I love those folks. Some of them I worked with for 19 years. ... There is a difference in (the news) job as far as personal relationships. There is a leadership component within the news division which I anticipated but not fully enough. People look to the program in a different way. People repress what you say internally (here) more than they do at GMA.

Q:What's it like earning the trust of the people who work for you?

A: I've been around so long that I'm part of the woodwork. I know the producers in Chicago, I know the people in London, I know whatever. I think one of the reasons David (Westin, president of ABC News) asked me to do the job is that after that double whammy, Peter's death and Bob's injury, there was a certain angst that existed. What I offered was a sense of stability. I'm a known commodity.

One of the things that was important about election night — people point to the ratings, but I really felt it was an important night. I thought that if we had a successful election in terms of just doing a good job, that it would get people thinking prospectively rather than retrospectively. That it would be a turning-of-the-corner moment. A moving on.

Q:Has that happened?

A: I'm hoping it has. Election Day was only a week ago. To me, it was one of the most important things about it.

Q:As for Woodruff ...

A: He's in good shape. It's a crude analogy but (what he's done) is not unlike coming back from a stroke. It's just very slow. It's interesting how these injuries are rather idiosyncratic. His affected his speech center. And it's very specific. I noted when we had lunch that when he would fight for a word it was always a noun. It's parts-of-speech-specific.

Today his speech pattern is almost totally back. His voice doesn't have the same timbre that he had because a piece of shrapnel missed his vocal cords by this close (he raises thumb and forefinger, which almost touch). There's some facial scarring, but that's fixable. The scars on his head are all covered by hair now.

Q:I read that your time as anchor will be limited.

A: I honestly don't know. I have a contract, and if they offer me another contract, we'll talk. We'll do it through the 2008 election, and a little after that, and then we'll see.

There's a beginning elation to it all and an energizing effect; I'm probably still in the first blush of that. But I'm enjoying it. And if that continues, maybe we'll go on later, I don't know.